


NERVous Breakdown

by Tabac_Iberez



Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion, XCOM (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Crossover
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 17:36:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10313507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabac_Iberez/pseuds/Tabac_Iberez
Summary: After fighting off the Alien Invasion, the soldiers of the world only want peace and rest. For six years, they get it.Then the Angels arrived.Now, as XCOM frantically absorbs the bitter pill that was NERV as they ready themselves, an old Commander takes back his place as the leader of the free world's resistance against the forces of the enemy, no matter who they are.





	1. Chapter 1

“So long as the stars are in the sky, trust in our watch.” A young man said, watching his older commander carefully. “Translated into the Latin, ‘ _Dum sidera caeli confidunt in vigilia_ ’ so that the men can still holler their battle cries.”

  
The Commander smiled, and shook his head. “I hope battle cries are a non-issue, Badford. They deserve a rest and a pension now. So do we, come to think of it. One alien invasion is enough for a lifetime, thank you.”

  
Laughing, Bradford just rolled his shoulders and patted his old station in the command center fondly. “They’ll never shut us down all the way. They might re-socialize the ground pounders, get Shen to up and retire, return us back to our home bases, but God forbid they try and extinguish the charter.”

  
“You’re not talking about the incident in Brussels?” The Commander asked, rolling his eyes to high heaven. “I really, really hope you’re not talking about the incident in Brussels. I only want to shoot out a Muton’s eye with a plasma pistol once in my life, thank you very much.”

  
Bradford laughed now. “No, I was thinking of prying Vahlen out of her lab.”

  
Both men chuckled, and the Commander pulled open his chair’s secret alcohol slot and two tumblers. Pouring the near-black whiskey, he handed one glass to Bradford. “Cheers, my friend. To the best things in life- a peaceful day, an interesting night, and a fine house off Subic Bay!”

* * *

  
Three Years Later  
  
Looking at the TV screen, Bradford winced audibly. The area displayed was ruined, trashed beyond all belief. One end of the battlefield had held a monsterus, alien machine capable of wrecking untold destruction at the drop of a hat.

  
On the other end was an Angel.

  
“Rewind the tape.” Bradford asked the Operative slowly. “I’m thinking someone thought we went to sleep.”

  
The Operative laughed, and brought his right hand to the center of his sweater, right over the Seal. There was only one Seal, as far as he was concerned, and one Motto.  
“ _Vigilo Confiedo_ , Sir.”

* * *

  
Subic Bay, Sunset.  
\-----  
  
Inside the rather well-appointed cabana, a man snored in his chair, safe in knowing that he had done his duty. In the kitchen, his housekeeper worked on putting together a simple dinner, while her boss took the traditional siesta before going back to the closest thing to work he ever did anymore- organizing the local musical program down in the ex-American high school. It relaxed him, and helped keep the old meddler busy in his retirement.

  
As the housekeeper finished up on the rich gumbo the man liked, a phone went off. Going over to pick it up, she noticed something. This wasn’t the house’s old-fashioned rotary phone that the man loved to sit next to and talk with his old friends from the war on, discussing sports and science and the misadventures of their former brood. No, this phone was different. Black, with a gold-checkered inlay, the old athsteitcs of the bakelite corded phone combined with new technology, and a seal on the back. Picking it up, she answered cheerfully.

  
“Hola, Casa del musica principal de escuela de George Dewey. Quien es?”

  
On the other end of the phone, a great mumbling and juttering occurred, with several cries of “Ok, who speaks Spanish?” “Ow, my nose!” and “Why isn’t Bradford doing this himself?!” before a calm-ish voice got on the line.

  
“Hola. Me llamo est… Lieutenant Sabre… yo nessicta habla con Commander.”

  
The housekeeper screwed up her face and frowned. That man sounded distinctly like an American. The man who owned the house normally used Spanish- he was certainly more fluent in it than she in English- but she did know a bit.

  
“Yes, Lieutenant Savre, we have no…no commander here. Only music teacher.”

  
Again, there was a muffled roaring and confusion by the other end of the line. Finally, a different young man answered the line. He, at least, spoke Spanish well enough to communicate. Apparently, they needed to speak to the owner of the house as soon as possible. Sighing dramatically, the housekeeper went to get the owner, only to realize he was already there. As he took the phone, the housekeeper watched him listen carefully, the years slowly falling of his face. He might have come here to rest and relax, but he also grew older and calmed down.

When the phone call was done, the Commander rolled his shoulders and sighed.

  
“Consuela,” he said in his soft, round Spanish, “Pack my bags please, and make up a box dinner. I’m afraid I’ve been returned to duty.”

  
Nodding, the housekeeper went off. The Commander had long ago left a list of instructions in case he got reactivated, and it was time to get to work. As she watched the man leave in the odd plane that came down in the back yard, she sighed faintly. There was no rest for good men in this world, and her happy musician was unfortunate proof.  
  
Inside the Skyranger, the Commander looked at the videoconference screen in front of him. This was a familiar feeling, harking back to the beginning of the Long War.

  
“Hello, Commander.” The slightly-digitalized voice said, tone neutral as always. “In light of the newest extraterretial incursion, this council of nations has reactivated the XCOM project. You have been chosen again to lead Humanity’s first, last, and only line of defense. As before, your actions have a truly massive weight for the future of this planet. The council of nations was impressed and has resoundly applauded your actions in the Long War, and has as such elected you to serve as our sword and shield again."

  
The teleconference shifted now, to an unfamiliar logo of another organization- NERVE?

  
“Because of the unusual and extremely potent nature of the enemy, an outside group has been brought into the XCOM project for the duration of the emergency- NERV, a group that has made great leaps into the related fields of these aliens. Given the EXALT incidents, you will be in complete control of all operational assets, with the NERV units directly integrated into the existing chain of command.”

  
Finishing, the man from the Council looked up.  
  
“Good luck, Commander.”


	2. Pt 2; Lost And Damned

Looking out over the approaching Angel, the Commander frowned slightly. The new base, called the Geoscape by NERV, lacked all the comforts of home or even XCOM SEA base. No reasonably comfy chairs, no copies of the Seal everywhere, no bustling piles of orderlies, no coffee…

“So, our one giant fighting robot with a pilot is down, yes?” The Commander asked the sub-commander of what was formerly NERVE, now his direct Chief of Discovery. The title for Dr. Kozo Fuytsuki was more ornamental than anything- he still served as a general-purpose right hand man for all matters of Angelic bullshitery and what the NERVE guys could do. Gendo Ikari, the original boss of the Geoscape, had been moved over into the project to mass-produce the EVA units. Until Bradford could get brought up to speed, the good Doctor was stuck providing running commentary on the operations.

“That would be correct, sir. We still have Unit Oh-One, but Ayanami is currently recovering from combat.”

Muttering to himself, the Commander tried to look through his options. Conventional warheads had proved useless attacking the first Angel, the one prototype robot and pilot were still out of commission from the second Angel, and the “reserve pilot” that was in what little of Gendo’s files they had managed to “aquire” in the handover was still en route.

The choice was unpalpable, but the Commander made it anyway. “Sorte the Ares flight, full plasma load. Flight orders are to preform carousel rounds while Paladin flight charge their Fusion Lances. We’re only going to get one good shot at this- we need to land one decisive strike.”

To his forward right in the command center, the TACO nodded and started talking to XCOM SEA where the Firestorm flights were based. “ETA one minute thirty for Ares, two even for Paladin sir. Quote from Paladin Actual, ‘you want fries with this?’ end quote.”

The Commander grinned. “Thank you, Tactical Air Controller. Tell the guys that the recovery teams are on standby and promise to only use the pink fire foam.”

“Awfuly confident of your men, Commander.” The doctor said, tilting his head. “Nothing short of an EVA or multiple dozens of nukes has ever destroyed an Angel.”

“Well, say hello to multiple dozen nukes worth of ordy, then.” A new man said as he entered the command center. “Field Commander Nyugen reporting, sir- the ground compliment has the particle cannons set up and ready to roll, and Vahlen’s Special is emplaced.”

“Vahlen’s Special?” The Commander asked acerbicly, raising an eyebrow.

“Big, angry maser that has an accelerator coil on the nose and a plasma-pulse element on the rear. It uses bipity-bopity-boo physics to work like a particle accelerator, except it takes up about a fifth of the energy of a particle accelerator that size because of some shady math and a huge diamond. Before you ask more questions, remember I never graduated high school.”

Shaking his head, the Commander sighed. “And what are the odds of us punching through with all our combined firepower before and after we start lancing that bastard?”

“Bad. Before lance strikes, three in ten odds given a good salvo. After lance strikes and during, four in ten.”

Nodding, The Commander looked at Kozo flatly. “Your people better have that pilot inbound hot and fast. It’s going to be hell until he gets going.

* * *

 

On the ground, things were bad. The regular troops had been hitting the Angel with all that they had in their arsenal, but the attacks did nothing. Each shot bouncing off the damnable force field, counterbattery fire lancing back to destroy men and machine with brutal precision.

Amidst the chaos three hundred yards back, the XCOM soldiers worked at a breakneck pace to set up the field generators and power lines that would feed their mighty particle cannons. Each one weighed as much as ten men, their apertures smoking lightly from the force they emitted with nothing less than an iota of their full power. Waiting, the crews listened for the order to begin the bombardment and unleash their fury. Each crew had experience, either serving as anti-air in the Long War swatting down follow up bombers or a siege troops to dig EXALT out of their hundreds and thousands of hiding holes.

When the order came, they fired as one, each blue shaft of light striking like a thunderbolt- more so, as the mere thunderbolt had no force, only electricity. Each cannon accelerated less than a breath’s worth of helium and water to speeds best measured at speeds best measured at large fractions of c, and then let that beam of destruction loose on a target.

As the brilliant beams struck home, the Angel was almost pushed back, each one hitting home on its defensive fields. For a brief moment, as the glow of the Chernekov radiation faded away, the Angel stood still.

That short moment ended when the Angel counterattacked, throwing a lance of light and rage into a particle cannon nest, destroying the gun and crew in an instant. Swearing and cursing, the remainder resumed fire until the Vahlen’s Special let rip.

Where her little siblings could crack stone and shatter reinforced concrete, Valhen’s Special had originally been designed to build new bases- which meant punching a four hundred foot long shaft down into bedrock. This titanic power, one that had been built to rend the earth asunder, fired now, blinding anyone looking with bare eyes as Openhiemer’s Light flew out in a deathly blue glow. As the Angel pressed back, focusing on resisting the titanic force that was striking it like the fist of an angry God, it could not return fire.

Then the Firestorms came in. Plasma shot riddled the thing mercilessly, pasting itself across the energy that protected the beast with, while the follow-up Fusion Lance strikes opened up the glory of the sun near it. Fire burned it, radiation cooked it, and debris cut its field. Yet, it still held on to life, taking one step at a time to move closer to the Geoscape. One step, two steps. It had one purpose- get to the doors, and cleave it’s way through. To risk returning fire was to risk letting a shot through, and it could not allow that damage to harm it. In as much as it could think, the Angel had a plan. Get to the hatch. Get to the hatch, and wait. With its death, perhaps the destruction of the obstacle would let the next angel through. It itself did not need to succeed, but rather pave the way so that the next would be able to go further.

* * *

 

“Losses so far?” The Commander asked, face impassive.

“One particle cannon, one power station. Nine dead, forty casualties.” The TAGO said, face thin. “Power grid’s got one hour left of life left in it before we start need to field-meld in additional lines and nodes. Six guns are starting to experience overheating, and that thing keeps moving.”

“Noted. Kuzo, you know this building’s computer network best- how soon until our replacement pilot gets here?”

A few clicks later, and on a secondary monitor a picture of Shinji and Misato appeared, the boy nervously flicking through a document. Across the room, the mood of the XCOM operatives dropped like a stone. That was a kid in there. Stepping up to Kuzo, the snarling ex-operative that happened to be second only to the Commander himself on the ground almost went for his sidearm.

“Care to explain why in the hell you’ve got a kid in the car, Doctor?” Nyugen hissed, looking for all the world to see like a readied cobra. “Never knew you slobs needed a child to do a pilots job.”

“Field Commander Nyugen, stand down.” The Commander said quietly, watching his subordinate. “I’ll handle this soon enough.”

Even with the warning, the angry Laotian wouldn’t back down until the Commander stood up.

“I need to see our new EVA pilot. Dr. Kuzo, I’m afraid you’ll need to accompany me to get there. Hilltopper, you’re in command while I’m away.”

The mention of his nickname brought Nyugen out of his bullish rage, and brought him up short. “Aye, Sir. I have the command.”


	3. Pt 3; Circle of Innocents

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some chapters are shorter than others.

Travelling down to the EVA bay, the Commander looked over at his compatriots. War might have made strange bedfellows, but the people that he had been just put in charge of looked like jackals for the most part. They were proud, had something to prove. Whether to rage against the dying of the light or welcome the end with more than a whisper, it still irked him. This attitude was dangerous, something he had tried to pound out of his men at every opportunity. It would take some time to do here, and it needed doing. This desire to achieve was good in a limited sense; too much would bring down an empire.  
  
On arrival at the EVA bay, things progressed rapidly. The poor boy- Shinji Ikari, son of the _former_ commanding officer here- was dressed in the piloting suit, sweating bullets as he looked up into the rafters where his war machine was waiting. The Commander frowned, and ran his hand through his hair. War was his oldest companion, and yet looking at the boy who was the only one who could wield the avatar of power before him, he sighed. This would haunt him, he knew. Too many things did- Mexico City, the Newfoundland Expedition, the EXALT base in Berne, his ex-wife- but this? This would stain his soul.  
  
"Son." he said, solemnly looking at Shinji. "I'm not comfortable with this. I'm a soldier, not some mad scientist or demon gaijin from a comic or manga. But I will be honest with you- my men have died today. More still are wounded. I need help to keep them alive- your help. Your machine's help."  
  
Shinji nodded, stiff. The poor boy moved like a doll, held by sticks and strings.  
  
"I'm not going to lie- this will be painful. War always is. That said though, your job is going to be simple. All you need to do is get up there, and your suit's AT field will cancel out the Angel's. When that happens, all you need to do is hit the deck as our overwhelming firepower rips it to shreds. Worst case, it hits you once or twice. Ok, son?"  
  
Shinji nodded again. Lips tight, the Commander growled a simple order.  
  
"Say if you accept or not, son. A mutter isn't your word any more than a handshake a contact. I've never marched a drafted soldier into hell, and I'll die before I start."  
  
Shinji nodded, and swallowed nervously. "I will do it. I will pilot the EVA."  
  
The Commander nodded, and patted the boy on the shoulder. "Then welcome to XCOM. I'm sorry you joined this way, but we will never regret you. Follow the directions of the launch crew, and once you’re there keep your radio on. We’ll do everything we can to help you, so just stand strong.”  
  
For the last time that day, Shinji nodded and tried to salute. “Y-y-yes, Sir.”  
  
Shaking his head, The Commander returned the salute crisply. It was the least he could do.

* * *

  
  
As the EVA prepared to be launched to the surface, Shinji tried to pull himself together. He had to stand up- that was all he had to do. Stand, and hold his ground. Just stand there, and take a hit. He’d done that before- just let the strike come in, and land on him. It would hurt- the blows always did. Really, when didn’t things hurt? His Uncle’s words, his classmates’ stares, his father’s abandonment, they all hurt.  
  
Really, what was one more blow?  
  
As the rack touched the sky and put him on the Earth, Shinji tried to maneuver, his inexpert hands skittering across the controls in the bath of LCL he was suspended in. Stumbling and slipping, Shinji advanced on the Angel, trying to bring himself to bear.  
  
“This is TAGO to EVA-01, come in EVA-01, over.”  
  
Come in? What did that mean?  
  
“Ah, Shinji? That’s your name, right? I’m the TAGO- I’m gonna make sure you don’t step on one of our guys, ok? Say yes if you here me.”  
  
This, this Shinji could understand. He was here to help, not hurt! “Yes, this is Shinji, I hear you.”  
  
“Great!” the TAGO said, a smile in his voice. “Listen, you see the Angel off there, slightly to your left?”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Walk towards it, ok? There’s apparently a weapon delivery system in some fake buildings for you, and between you and it is an… ok, a Progressive Spear. I’m gonna trigger the building, you grab the spear, and if the Angel notices you then hold the pigsticker in front of you and we’ll nail it once it hits your AT field. Or you can stick it- ohshit.”  
  
As the TAGO swore quietly, the Angel turned to face Shinji and screamed. Pumping it’s legs, it charged him like a freight train. Shinji barely had enough time to turn slightly when it hit him, their AT fields entangling and canceling each other out. Trying to focus, the boy-pilot tried to bring his fist up, but the whip of the Angel swatted it out of the way while the other went for the EVA’s head.  
  
“Shinji, DUCK!” the TAGO yelled, and Shinji followed the order gracelessly as the blow sent him back. As the drilling cannon named after the lead researcher of XCOM fired, the Angel tried to project an AT field. Underneath its gaze, Shinji growled and pushed back, fighting against the AT field that the Angel was trying to project. As the highly-weakened AT field appeared away from the EVA and Angel, though, the heavy artillery swatted it aside like a fly. The angel had exited its realm, and was now thoroughly at the gunner’s mercy. Heavy spikes of blue light pierced it, the gunners tearing strips from their foe. All the while, Shinji just had to hold on.  
  
Then the Angel toppled and fell right on the EVA.

* * *

  
  
Looking out from the headquarters area, the Commander held his head and sighed. Pinned under the corpse of the Angel, Shinji was waggling his limbs and trying to push up against the ground to get out, occasionally flailing. Picking up the horn, the Commander keyed his address all option.  
  
“All XCOM troops, good work today.”  
  
Another short toggle on the Big Board, and the Commander made sure his chuckle was done before the next thing he had to say. “Shinji, good work there. Stay put, ok? We’ve got recovery vehicles inbound to haul the Angel carcass off, and they’ll help you stand up. Are you doing ok?”  
  
Shinji thought for a moment, and rubbed the back of his head. That fall had hurt, and the Angel was none too comfortable a blanket. “I think I’m fine, sir.”  
  
“Alright, son. Just hold tight- we’ll be there.”

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone interested in reading this "live" inasmuch as i write and discuss my work, this is hosted first at https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/nervous-breakdown-nge-xcom.488827/ where you can talk about it. For anyone wondering, XCOM is a classical turn-based strategy, and Long War about tripples the length of the game. Anyone who doesn't know NGE doesn't watch anime anyway, so I won't explain it today.


End file.
